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      Examples & Benefits of Using Boards

      Review real-life examples of complex projects and the benefits of using matter-management boards to increase project efficiency and execution.

      Overview:

      • In this video we go through how low tech (physical) matter-management boards can be created quickly to deal with complex matters, and using digital boards to ensure efficient delivery of tasks from anywhere and the benefits of using matter-management boards.
      • This video shows you how to create and use a matter-management board to manage complex matters, accounting for stage in those matters.
        • The first is a physical board created to manage a large real estate transaction. As you can see, the columns of "To Do", and "Done" remain as bookends to the board as these are foundational columns (the alpha and omega) of tracking your matter tasks.
        • The "Doing" column, becomes the workstreams or phases of your matter, and in this example, is split into 9 separate columns.
      • The principles and benefits of using boards to manage and track tasks, can of course be used outside of matter management. The next board is an example of tracking internal improvement projects across a number of practice groups in a firm, and in another video in the series you will be talked through how these boards are created and organized.
      • Physical boards however, are of little help and entirely impractical when working with a matter team who are dispersed among multiple locations. In such a scenario, and one which is more and more common, a digital matter-management board is the appropriate solution.
        • Digital matter-management boards are mostly cloud hosted solutions, allowing lawyers and allied professionals to log-in and update the board and receive new tasks, at any time from anywhere. These solutions will likely come with a host of other features to aid in the efficient expedition matter related tasks and which enhance communication and collaboration within the team.

      The Benefits of Using Matter-Management Boards:

      • There are many benefits to using matter-management boards to help expedite your matters, and below is a non-exhaustive list of some of those benefits.
        • Whether physical or digital, matter-management boards are simply to set up and easy to maintain.
        • They are flexible solutions allowing to determine what data track, and can be adapted to many different use cases.
        • They are visual aids which ensure that the matter team understand, at a glance, where the matter is in its progression and what tasks remain outstanding.
        • Matter-management boards significantly improve efficiency by readily identifying bottlenecks and potential issues which may effect timing.
        • Collaboration is greatly enhanced as every member of the matter team understands what tasks are assigned to who, and the status of each.
        • The overview of the matter provided by the board also means that less time is spent on administrative tasks such as on meetings and general updates.

      Having easy insight into who’s doing what and when, allows project managers and coordinating lawyers to better allocate work within a team.

      • In short, using the kanban methodology to create highly visual matter-management boards can significantly improve the efficiency and effectiveness with which projects, whatever their nature or complexity, are managed and executed

      Below is a checklist you can use when setting up your matter management board:

      Checklist

      Reserve an office or conference room with plenty of empty wall space or whiteboards that can be preserved for the life of the project (physical boards only)

      Gather supplies for physical boards:

      • tape
      • super-sticky colored stickies
      • markers
      • colored flags
      • stamp for data fields (optional)

      Determine how your board will be structured. (see a Guide to planning your board)

      • Select logical phases of your matter (or workload, if using your board to manage WIP) to serve as column headings
      • Decide what categories of task you will be tracking (e.g. documents, issues, due diligence)
      • Determine color-coding system for your task cards

      Determine what information will be recorded on each task card

      Examples for managing a matter include:

      • Task description
      • Start date
      • Due date or end date
      • Assignee
      • Priority
      • Status/Progress
      • Task category
      • Task jurisdiction

      Examples for managing workload across a practice group include:

      • Project or filename
      • Start date
      • Anticipated closing or end date
      • Team (partners, associates, paralegals, assistants)
      • Priority
      • Status/Progress

      Have the structure and organization approved by the supervising lawyer

      Populate the To Do column on board with all of the known tasks

      Schedule the kick-off meeting with team members (lawyers, paralegals, clerks, etc.)

      • Review and confirm phases
      • Review and confirm tasks
      • Add and/or modify task cards and move as necessary
      • Make and/or modify initial assignments
      • Confirm expectations on how often the board must be updated

      To learn more about using matter management boards click here to go to our full knowledge pack.

      To learn more about using matter management boards click here to the next article on Setting up and managing your board.